How is it unreliable?

...but I would think there'd have to be a 'native perl' -way to do it?

Why? If Win32::Process::Info is not native, is Win32::GuiTest 'native'? Win32::OLE?

I've scoured through CPAN and had a look through the Monks' site but have had no joy.

?node_id=3989;HIT=title;re=N

How To Read Win32 Window Title Text

How can I fetch text from Windows Title Bars?

I would appreciate any thoughts on a 'more elegant' means to approach the problem.

:) Thats one of those in the eye of the beholder deals, my definition: does it do what I want? does it save me work?

I'll admit I haven't used the Win32::Process::Info before today but consider the following code:

use Win32::Process::Info

my $st = Win32::Process::Info->import('NT', 'WMI');
my $pi = Win32::Process::Info->new (undef, 'WMI');

my @pids = $pi->ListPids ();  
my @info = $pi->GetProcInfo ();

for my $prc (@info){
printf("%s, %s, %s\n", 
         $prc->{"ProcessId"}, 
         $prc->{"Name"},
         $prc->{"Description"}
       );
}
[download]

When run, this code will make the cmd.exe session variously: a) run without error; b) fail with a "...has encountered a problem and needs to close..." dialog being shown; c) fail with a "The memory could not be 'read'." dialog being shown; d) hang until I terminate the perl.exe image manually with Task Manager. This appears, at least, not very robust to me.

Re: a 'native' way.. I tend to think if there's some CLI utility that produces some sort of useful output, there has to be a way that Perl can do the same (providing someone has built-up a module)... or at least if it's something that's managed/controlled by Windows, I should be able to call Windows to do my job for me, rather than starting from scratch; I just have this thing that I don't like to 'shell' to the OS -- it just seems to be like "giving-up" or something...(!)

...and I guess my queries in the Supersearch were lacking, 'coz somehow I didn't catch those Monks' site nodes, thanks.

I'll go and see if I can decipher the intricacies of Win32::GuiTest and Win32::API::Callback...

You say:

I just have this thing that I don't like to 'shell' to the OS -- it just seems to be like "giving-up" or something...(!)

After just having said:

I should be able to call Windows to do my job for me,

Run this:

tasklist /nh /v | perl -nle"@a=unpack'A29A5A123A*',$_; print join'|',@
+a[1,3]"
[download]

That's Windows "doing your job for you".

---

Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error.

"Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority".

In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.

This appears, at least, not very robust to me.

What versions of each are you running? (perl , os, modules/Devel::Modlist)

...but I would think there'd have to be a 'native perl' -way to do it?

Why? Why should Perl--a console-based scripting language born of Unix--have a "native way" of accessing the title texts of Windows windows?

As a mechanism for checking whether a particular instance of a process is running, this seems to be the dumbest mechanism possible.

If these are processes you started--they're none of your business otherwise right?--then, why not just retain the pids of the processes you started and periodically check whether they are still running?

Just for completeness, I thought I'd drop through a note to say that the job monitoring is working well at present... *fingers' crossed*...

Here's the segment of code where all the magic happens:-

use Win32::GuiTest qw(FindWindowLike GetWindowText);

[...]

sub Check_Job
{
   my ($site_num) = @_;
   
   my ($buf, $num_windows);
   my (@windows);

   $buf = sprintf("^%s - Socks", $site_num);

   @windows = FindWindowLike(0, $buf);
   $num_windows = @windows;
  
   if ($num_windows == 0) {  # NO WINDOWS! Need to resubmit
      $st = 0;

   } elsif ($num_windows != 1) { # MULTI-WINDOWS!  Oops!!
      printf("%s: WARNING: There are %d Socks windows for site %d!!!\n
+", 
              $my_proc, $num_windows, $site_num);
      $st = 2;              

   } else {  # ONE-ONLY WINDOW - GOOD!
      $st = 1;

   }
   return($st);
} # end Check_Job
[download]

Many thanks, once again, for everyone's help.

#!/usr/bin/perl --

use strict;
use warnings;

use Win32::Process qw/
NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS 
CREATE_NEW_CONSOLE
/;

use Win32::GuiTest qw/
IsWindowVisible
IsWindowEnabled
FindWindowLike
GetWindowText
GetClassName
GetChildDepth
GetDesktopWindow
WaitWindow
/;

use Win32::API;

$Win32::GuiTest::debug = @ARGV;

exit Fafafa();



BEGIN {
    Win32::API::->Import("user32","DWORD GetWindowThreadProcessId( HWN
+D hWnd, LPDWORD lpdwProcessId)") or die $^E;
    sub TidPid {
        my $pid = pack 'L!',0 ;
        my $tid = GetWindowThreadProcessId($_[0], $pid);
        $pid = unpack 'L!', $pid;
        return $tid, $pid ;
    }
    sub Tid { ( TidPid(@_))[0] }
    sub Pid { ( TidPid(@_))[1] }
}



sub ErrorReport {
    print Win32::FormatMessage( Win32::GetLastError() );
}

sub Fafafa {
    my %cmd;
    for( 1 .. 3 ){
        Win32::Process::Create(
            my $cmdp,
            "$ENV{WINDIR}\\system32\\cmd.exe",
            "/K  title $_ - Socks",
            0,# don't inherit nothing
            NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS | CREATE_NEW_CONSOLE,
            '.'
        )
            or die ErrorReport();
        $cmd{ $cmdp->GetProcessID } = $cmdp;
    }

    print "pid $$\n";
    print "sleep 1, so the GUIs come up\n";
    for(1..3){  WaitWindow("$_ - Socks"); } # too fast, so sleep after
+wards
    sleep 1;
    
#~     for( FindWindowLike(undef,' - Socks','ConsoleWindowClass') ){

    for (FindWindowLike((undef) x 4, 1)) {
        next unless
            IsWindowEnabled($_)
                or IsWindowVisible($_);

        next unless $cmd{ Pid( $_ ) }; # the parent is us

        printf "0x%08X (%8d) %8d/%8d %-30s '%s'\n",
                    $_,
                    $_,
                    TidPid($_),
                    GetClassName($_),
                    GetWindowText($_) ;
    }

    for ( values %cmd ){
        printf "Killing %d\n", $_->GetProcessID();
        $_->Kill(0);
    }

    0;
}

__END__

pid 1204
sleep 1, so the GUIs come up
0x002403D0 ( 2360272)     1888/    1684 ConsoleWindowClass            
+ '3 - Socks'
0x002003B8 ( 2098104)     1496/    1992 ConsoleWindowClass            
+ '2 - Socks'
0x002B0384 ( 2818948)     1412/    1692 ConsoleWindowClass            
+ '1 - Socks'
Killing 1684
Killing 1692
Killing 1992
[download]